A handwritten thank-you card was life-changing for Father George Younes more than 20 years ago. It radically altered his plans for a move to Australia and led to his priestly ordination in the Maronite Catholic Church on July 26 at St. Maron in northeast Minneapolis.
Father Younes, 47, first felt a call to the priesthood when he was 18, living with his family in the western suburbs of the Twin Cities and attending St. Maron, one of two Maronite parishes in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.
The fall after his high school graduation in 1997, he enrolled at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul and spent the next four years at St. John Vianney College Seminary. After getting degrees in Catholic Studies, philosophy and theology, his path toward holy orders continued when he began studies at Our Lady of Lebanon, a Maronite seminary, in Washington, D.C.
But, while there, a second vocational calling began to take root: marriage. In the Latin Catholic Church, feeling called to both is a conundrum. A man must choose between the two, with ordination to the permanent diaconate the only clerical option for men choosing marriage.
Yet, Father Younes felt drawn to both marriage and ordination to the priesthood. In earlier centuries, both were possible around the globe for Maronites and other members of the Eastern Catholic churches. While there was never the possibility for an ordained priest to marry after ordination, the Eastern Churches did allow for married men to be ordained, provided that the Church determined that they were called to the priesthood. The Maronite Church, while esteeming the life of celibacy (and limiting the episcopacy to unmarried men), had traditionally allowed the priestly ordination of married men. That ended in the Western Hemisphere in 1929 when a papal mandate by Pope Pius XI suspended the previous allowance for married clergy in Eastern churches.
With this restriction still intact, Father Younes explored further to see if there were ways to navigate around the ban. He learned that there were possibilities in places like Australia. Thus, while still studying in D.C., he traveled to Australia to explore being a married priest there. He liked this option because English is the country’s main language.
He met two married Maronite priests there and found encouragement for his desire to pursue both vocations. He seemed destined to move to Australia, where he hoped to find a wife and live as a married Maronite priest.
Change of plans
Enter Zahura Kerkinni. In December 2002, Kerkinni, who is Syriac Orthodox but attends St. Maron with her family, invited Father Younes over for a get-together at her family’s home in the Twin Cities. That evening, Dec. 22, she introduced Father Younes to her daughter, Susan, four years younger than Father Younes. That changed everything.
It wasn’t love at first sight because Father Younes had decided to go to Australia. But his conversation with Susan Kerkinni was enjoyable enough that he sought her out at a New Year’s party at St. Maron just over a week later. More conversations followed.
After one of those early conversations, he received something surprising in the mail.
“She sent me a very beautiful thank-you card,” Father Younes recalled. “I could read a little between the lines. And I thought, ‘Oh my goodness. There could be a possible (romantic) relationship starting.’”
They both discovered there were mutual romantic feelings. So, they started dating. Wedding bells rang on July 3, 2005, when they married at St. Maron.
For the moment, marriage had won out. Father Younes decided to figure out priesthood later, though he did indicate to Susan that he might still consider moving to Australia to become a married priest. She was at least open to it. But, at the time, he knew that becoming a deacon was as far as he could go in his home state and country, so he made that his aim and was ordained at St. Maron. Meanwhile, the couple started a family, eventually having four children: Rebecca, 18; Maria, 15; Thomas, 13; and Lucas, 11.
Then came a big change in 2014, when Pope Francis revoked the previous papal order, re-opening the door for Father Younes and other Eastern Catholic married men to pursue priesthood, even in the United States. The first married Maronite man to be ordained to the priesthood after the pope’s move was Father Wissam Akiki on Feb. 27, 2014, at St. Raymond Maronite Cathedral in St. Louis.
Eight more ordinations followed, then came Father Younes, whose ordination was the first of a married Maronite man in Minnesota. Bishop A. Elias Zaidan of the U.S. Maronite Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon of Los Angeles was the presiding bishop at the ordination. Bishop Zaidan also ordained Father Akiki, who currently serves in Phoenix. Archbishop Bernard Hebda concelebrated the ordination of Father Younes, along with several other Latin priests of the archdiocese, who joined Maronite clergy on the altar.
Family affair
The ordination liturgy of Father Younes involved his entire family. Susan and the children all took active roles, with Thomas and Lucas serving at the altar and Rebecca and Maria singing in the choir. The children and Susan also participated in the various rites within the liturgy, which featured noticeable differences from Latin ordination Masses. All six members of the family gave remarks at the reception following the liturgy, which began with song and celebration and the presentation of a cake marking the occasion.
Family members felt a sense of joy that years of working and waiting finally came to fruition.
“Honestly, I’m excited for him,” said Rebecca Younes, who recently graduated from the Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield and will attend Ave Maria University in Florida. “I’m glad that he’s finally able to fulfill God’s will and able to finally live out his dream.”
Chorbishop Sharbel Maroun, the pastor of St. Maron, arrived at the parish when Father Younes was in grade school. The young boy captured the attention of a pastor who has watched him grow and develop into a mature man of faith. Chorbishop Sharbel has performed numerous sacraments for the Younes family, including the wedding liturgy for George and Susan, and he baptized their four children. He also participated in the liturgy that conferred the sacrament of holy orders, formally presenting Deacon Younes to Bishop Zaidan for ordination to the priesthood.
“I feel this is something that is right and fair for him,” Chorbishop Sharbel said. “He has always desired this in his heart and it’s fitting for him because he’s a serious man. He’s very committed to his faith, to his church and to his family.”
Father Younes will serve both Maronite parishes in the Twin Cities, St. Maron and Holy Family Maronite in Mendota Heights. An important part of his ministry will be celebrating weekend liturgies when the pastors are out of town. Chorbishop Sharbel travels regularly in his role as vicar general of the eparchy. Now, rather than quickly jumping on a plane to get back in time for weekend liturgies, he can slow the pace just a bit, knowing that Father Younes can celebrate liturgy in his absence.
As he works to fill in for the two pastors and perform other priestly duties, Father Younes will be learning to balance the roles of husband and priest. Now that his children are getting older, the parental load will lighten somewhat. This could open the door to moving to another city to serve if the bishop chooses to re-assign him. Father Younes and Susan talked about this before getting married, so that she would know what life could be like if his priesthood dream became a reality.
She recalled how she felt about this when she first met George at age 20. “I was thinking to myself, ‘Yes, I can see myself married to George.’ And I would go wherever he wants to be.”
Today, her answer is the same. “I just go wherever he goes,” she said. “It’ll be hard to move our family because we’re so used to being here in Minnesota. But, if the bishop needs him to move, then we will have to move together as a family.”
Marriage and celibacy
Moving is a possibility Father Younes will always have to be ready for. Another thought on his mind is how Catholics outside the Eastern churches view married Maronite priests. Others may feel tension about how these two callings can meld into one, and they may wonder how one man can possibly fulfill both roles.
Father Younes has thought about this for decades and has a reply.
“We don’t look at it (having priests who are married) as something to offend or argue against celibacy,” he said. “We look at it as a way to support celibacy. And we want to make sure that the wider Catholic community understands that both of these vocations must work together.”
He also stressed that the Maronite church and other Eastern churches continue to value celibacy and will always have celibate priests. Chorbishop Sharbel said all 13 pastors in St. Maron’s 122-year history have been celibate, including himself, and that won’t change.
Father Younes doesn’t see his ordination as a vote against celibacy, but rather a vote for it and for all the ways in which people serve the Catholic Church as a whole.
“Without good celibacy, we will not have good marriages,” he said. “And without good marriages, we cannot have good celibacy. They are two sides of the same coin. The goal of both vocations is to bring souls to heaven.”
These sentiments were echoed by Father Thomas Wilson, pastor of All Saints in Lakeville. He attended the liturgy with another priest of the parish, Father Joseph Nguyen, and more than a dozen parishioners. Susan Younes is on staff full time at the school, and the family sent all four of their children to the school, beginning when they moved to Lakeville in 2009.
“We’ve been very excited about Deacon George getting ordained a priest,” said Father Wilson, noting that Father Younes has participated in adult education at the parish and has gotten to know parishioners. “I’ve participated in a few Maronite liturgies in the past and it’s just beautiful, a beautiful rite.”
He called the July ordination liturgy “an opportunity to teach about the beauty of the priesthood.” Though the reality of married priests in the Maronite Catholic Church may cause tension for some, Father Wilson said he sees it as a way to delve deeper into Church teaching.
“I think it’s a blessing, I think it’s a gift, I think it’s an opportunity for catechesis (on) the theology of priesthood,” Father Wilson said. “I think that too many people do not understand the complementarity of celibacy and marriage, and too many people don’t understand the theology of priesthood. … There’s a beauty and complementarity of marriage and celibacy. The Church does not function if both of them aren’t working well.”
There is the possibility that another married Maronite priest could come from the Younes household. Thomas Younes said he has thought about it and even discussed it with his father. “Quite a bit, actually,” Father Younes noted.
For now, the family will celebrate the new role their father accepted with his July 26 ordination.
“I’m very proud of my dad,” Maria Younes said. “We’ve all seen him work very hard and it’s like a reward seeing him achieve his dream.”
Ordination to the priesthood gives Father Younes a new identity, summarized in the words of his youngest son, Lucas:
“My father finally became a true father.”
